Art as a way of saying thanks

Graphics

A cheerful new sign decorates the entrance to the Orange County Sheriff's substation in San Clemente. “You can't look at it and be angry,” Deputy Shane Stewart said the first time he saw it.

The sign is artist Joyce Poisson's way of saying thanks to first responders – and to Stewart, in particular – for giving her back her husband.

On March 4, 2011, Walter “Skip” Jones was traveling from his San Clemente home to a routine doctor's appointment, riding his motorcycle down Avenida Presidio into a curve.

SPLIT-SECOND DILEMMA

Jones braked as a construction truck slowly pulled out of a driveway to turn right on Presidio from Our Lady of Fatima Catholic Church. Children on foot were getting out of school.

The last thing he remembers was a pickup truck – a seemingly impatient driver who had been stuck behind the slow-moving big truck – darting out and turning left onto Presidio into Jones' path. If he tried to veer to the right to avoid colliding with the truck, he might crash into the kids.

“The last thing I remember was children … truck … and I threw the bike down.”

He would awaken three weeks later from a coma at Mission Hospital, told that it was a miracle he was alive after leaving the bike and slamming face-first into a brick wall. He and his wife, Joyce – then his fiancée – say they owe his life to Deputies Stewart and Robert “Doc” Sutton, who were there almost instantly, and to Orange County Fire Authority paramedics, who were right behind.

GOOD FORTUNE

It helped that the crash occurred less than a block from San Clemente's police and fire stations.

Poisson said Stewart not only went to her house to gently deliver the grim news but phoned repeatedly to check on her and on Jones' recovery. He visited Jones and met his son.

After flatlining en route to Mission Hospital's trauma center and being revived by Fire Authority paramedics, Jones said he faced 103 fractures in his face, titanium replacements in his forehead, broken teeth, a wired-on jaw, two fractured vertebrae, a brain injury and punctured lungs. Surgery took nine hours.

“This is the first time I've heard him speak,” Stewart said at their meeting more than two years after the accident. Jones' jaw had been wired shut the last time the deputy had seen him.

TIMES CHANGE

A year ago, Stewart transferred from San Clemente to the sheriff's traffic bureau in Aliso Viejo, but he returned to reunite with Poisson and Jones and view the artist's token of thanks on the Sheriff's Department's front wall.

It replaces a weathered sign with the Sheriff's Department star. Lt. John Coppock, chief of police services in San Clemente, had noticed public art that the city sponsors and asked Laura Ferguson, coordinator of the art, if she knew an artist who might be willing to apply a little magic outside his front door.

Ferguson knew just the person. Poisson created one of 10 public artworks decorating traffic-signal control boxes around town. She sketched an illustration for San Clemente's new General Plan. She painted murals at two schools her children attended.

Ferguson was sure she'd say yes.

A SURPRISE IN STORE

When asked whether she and her husband could meet with Stewart to inspect the new sign, Poisson saw an opportunity.

She recalled how, on one of Stewart's visits, he had noticed paintings in her studio and especially admired one. As they reunited, she presented it to him.

“I'm a huge fan of her work,” Stewart said.

“We are your biggest fans,” Poisson replied.

HOW HE'S DOING

After returning home in April 2011, Jones was back to work as a technical engineer within weeks.

“I'm in about as good a shape as I've ever been in,” he said, adding that there can be a little numbness. “It feels like someone smacked me in the mouth here,” he said, “but I'm OK.”

The wall isn't. Brick fragments that flew when Jones' face and helmet struck the wall were still strewn on the ground when Jones, Poisson and Stewart revisited the crash scene.

“We thought the worst,” Stewart said.

“I tell people I've died several times and lived to tell about it,” Jones said.

MARRIAGE DATE

“We had a lot to celebrate,” Poisson said, so they picked a wedding date of 11-11-11. She recalled Stewart telling her that the stars had aligned the day of the crash to save Jones' life.

Poisson said the episode has widened her appreciation for the dedication of deputies and fire personnel.

Stewart, though, was quick to return the thanks.

“Most of the time it's a pretty thankless job,” he said. “And here, two and a half years later, Walter and Joyce are here to tell us how much they appreciate what we did.”

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